American Handgunner May/June 1977

ight kidney, passed just over the heart,torn a quarter-sized hole in his left lunggoing in and a bigger one going out, andlodged in the meat of his left shoulderwithout breaking a rib. The bullet had expandedperfectly. That, too, would havebeen an adequate kill.My fourth bullet hadn't hit the ram atall: it had struck a rock between his feet,and shards of flying stone and lead hadtorn a gaping three-inch wound that hadcut his left rear leg to the bone. That explainedthe spectacular dust-puff on myjerked shot. The first two had been infront of the animal because I had underestimatedthe velocity of the Remingtonload, and led him too far.He was a good trophy. Like I said, hewouldn't have done much for RowlandWard, because his head was scarred fromrecent battles with younger rams, and hishorns were broomed on the ends from theimpact of combat in the wild. That wasfine with me. If I want a perfect biologicalspecimen, I'll go to a zoo or a museum.Here was a tough animal, a leader, a veteranof combat with his own kind and ofyears spent outwitting human hunters.That, to me, made him a hell of a specimen,and a hell of an adversary.Charlie confirmed Hal's speculationthat this was, indeed, the first head ofgame shot double-action at the Y-0. It wasalso the farthest anybody had taken runninggame with a handgun, to either man'srecollection: the first bullet had struck theflat-out-running ram at 66 yards, and theshot that killed him where he stopped wasfired from a measured 74.Which was only lukewarm %comfort. Ihad come here to get my shooting confidenceback, and had blown three out ofRemington 125-grain jacketed hollow~int -357 performed superbly on ram.This perfectly mushroomed slug was dug from shoulder .after 66 yard shot.five shots at my quarry. The next time, Ivowed, it would be a one-shot kill.The second target was for food, notwall-mounting. The ram had been six orseven years old, and weighed around ahundred pounds. A ram of that age can beeaten only if yoh have ywtooth dentures,though barbecuing with the right saucesand the right skill can make it an eatingdelight for one with an adventurous palate.My host, Charlie Schreiner, didn'ttrust my gourmet cooking skills (boy, canhe judge people right), and decided that ifI was his guest, I should leave with someterrific eatin' meat. "I'll buy that," Iagreed cheerfully. "What's the best eatin'meat you got-apart from Bobbie'schicken fried steak, that is?" "A nice, fat,Axis doe," Charlie and Hal replied in unison.An Axis doe it was. These deer, nativeto India, grow to the size of a big NewHampshire whitetail or a bit larger, andjust as they never lose their spots whenthey mature, they never lose their babysofttexture and deliciousness.They do, however, lose their innocence.An Axis deer is as wary and tough to stalkas a whitetail, or one of the new breed ofsmart- mule deer. Harvey and Hal and Ispent a long, long time scouting untoldmiles of prairie before we found sign ofthe big dappled deer. Hamey's binoculmcaught dark shapes moving in the yuccatrees that lined an arroyo. ("Is that whatyou call a gulch?" I asked innocently inmy New Hampshire accent. "No," Harveyreplied patiently in his own Texas drawl,"that's what you call a bgulch'.")But in any man's language, they weredeer. There were does, and a spectacularlyhandsome buck. . . and fawns. "I'd just assoon you didn't shoot a mother deer," saidHarvey."Me neither," I agreed. "Big Macs maynot taste like venison, but they don't giveme guilt pangs, either." I fastened thesafety strap on my Bucheimer-Clark hol-(continued on page 67)Author with downed Axi 's deer,brought down with a Dan WessonPacese tter .357 Magnum Caliber.